About Us

About Us

Calyx Advisors, PC offers customized information, advice, and services to clients in all aspects of their giving. Calyx Philanthropy Advisors, maintains a network of outstanding consultants, grantmakers, attorneys, accountants, investment managers, wealth advisors, and other professionals and community leaders who provide guidance on a range of philanthropic, operational, and business matters. Drawing from an experienced leadership team, Calyx has worked with individuals, families, corporations, and foundations to establish grantmaking entities, define mission statements and grantmaking priorities, resolve donor intent, and develop an organizational roadmap for the future. We also work clients to design philanthropic programs and strategies, briefing them on issues of concern and personal interest. We work with families to address family-related philanthropic challenges and offer clients expert guidance on a variety of governance matters. Finally, we help make connections between clients’ charitable giving and the world and identify ways their philanthropy can make truly significant change. In every case, we work with clients and their advisors to determine how best to achieve their goals. with both new and established foundations to design, create, and refine grantmaking programs. Calyx clients include individuals and families as well as foundations, trusts, donor-advised funds, other professional advisors, and giving circles.

Calyx Philanthropic Mission and Vision

Calyx will help you increase the overall value of a brand--whether philanthropic, charitable, or family legacy by:

Working with individuals and organizations to bring more strategic branding, effective operations and staff development, and fulfilling legacies to fruition, Calyx strives to meet these critical goals for every client. Crafting creative, leveraged and productive approaches to solving important social issues--this is the work that inspires us. In turn, our ultimate goal is to inspire greater generosity--of spirit, time, talent and wealth-- and in the process, engage more individuals, office-seekers, families, companies and organizations to become deeply engaged in building stronger community fibers. After all, stimulating more community members regardless of income to become more educated, critical, and organized in their approach to community wellness will result in a better quality of life for all of us.

Core Beliefs

The application of private resources for public good is a central element of a healthy and democratic society. The best philanthropy envisions giving as a serious investment opportunity and an entrepreneurial service to the common good. Successful philanthropic endeavors aim for long-term positive impact – and thus, strategies with the greatest potential for change are grounded in an understanding of whole systems and causes, rather than symptoms of problems. Effective partnerships between donors and recipients respect the experience and ideas of all parties and produce mutual learning and better results for society.

The most rewarding and sustainable giving is based on the intersection of a donor’s passions, critical community/social needs and strategic philanthropy.

Everyone has valuable resources to invest in the public good.

Our vision will be reached earlier and most successfully through abundant sharing, collegiality and collaboration.

Clients

We have worked with local, state and federal political clients, political party organizations, and foundations of athletes, professional sports teams, musicians, actors, artists, large and small private foundations, public charities and community foundations, as well as high net worth individual and family funders.

Some of these clients have been quite well known, others quite discreet. Some have very deep pockets, others clearly on the rise. Some have been well established, others much newer. Some have decided to integrate new generational family leaderships, others are committed to spending down their assets, and still others want to make a difference through elected public service. Some clients are anxious to refocus their giving, or to assess whether their strategies still make sense, or to see if their philanthropy is accomplishing everything they hope for it. Especially in the area of evaluation, many funders prefer that we work directly with their grantees.

Clients who are most suited for us are those who recognize that there are things that need attention, that some decision needs to be made, that there are choices to consider. Many prefer our boutique approach and our independence, allowing them to deal with sensitive matters in a most discreet way.

We regularly help determine, articulate and align funder strategies or evaluate the projects where money has already been pledged or given. We are quite comfortable referring potential clients to others if it is clear that our business model and competencies don’t correspond to the needs of that funder. And, of course, we take NO development or fundraising contracts.

Since discretion, trust, and confidentiality play such a key role in our work, we do not list our foundation and private funder clients. However, we would be happy to share references upon request.